Lord of the Rings?

On my way home tonight I detoured so I could go past the first ring of Anish Kapoor's Temenos in Middlesbrough. This is a huge sculpture, or the first part of five over a decade (or so) - lauded as the world's biggest public art initiative when it launched in July 2008. You can see what I wrote about it then here, read about the raising of the ring here and see a photo above. Be assured, the Transporter Bridge is not that far away - this really is big. (There's also a great photo on the Evening Gazette website here, but I'm not borrowing that out of respect for the fantastic project manager Sean.)

There is only the first ring in place, but it is impressive and enjoyable in its own right, like looking at the first few marks an artist might make on a drawing or a painting. (Except, of course, you don't need years' of detailed engineering studies and so on to start a painting. )

The ironies of the piece, its location, conception and materials have only deepened since the launch, with the potential closure of Corus's steel plant just down river at Redcar. Regeneration has not got any easier, or any less important. But the imaginative impact perhaps only gains power from that. I can't wait to see it take shape over the next months - apparently the 'net' takes some time to be made taut.

(The eagle-eyed who read my July 2008 blog will deduce the project is slightly late getting finished. An accident early in the construction process led to some delays. It's nothing to the gestation period required for great big horses though...)

Just play music

It's Friday afternoon. The sky above the railway station is gradually fading from white through grey to black. It's been a busy week, full of meetings and discussions and decisions and brain strain. My piece on the ACE consultation drew some very personal comments - I don't mind people disliking my ideas, but take criticism of my prose style to heart! I've just finished a letter in support of some artists from the Eastern Cape in South Africa who've been refused visas to travel to take part in a major education programme in the Spring. A pint or a gin and tonic wouldn't go amiss, to be honest.


Days like this I will often go home and have a little noodle around on the guitar to decompress. I like to sing songs, but nothing relaxes me quite like just playing. (It's a non-aggressive way of getting the effect a game of fiveaside has on me.) There was a great article in The Guardian about amateur music making, by Charlotte Higgins, this week which really made me want to do this with some other people too. The people just sounded as if they were having so much fun and getting so much depth out of the experience. Play is, after all, a very serious thing.

Charlotte meets a number of orchestras and groups, and also communicates her own passion for playing. I'm no classical music buff, so my music making is in another sphere, which makes it hard to avoid the '40something-guitar-dad' cliches when even thinking about playing with other people. I don't mind inflicting those on my family through the walls, but would draw the line at strangers. (I think of my staff here like family, obviously, hence our inflicting the Management Team Ukulele Orchestra on them at one party.)


One person says something I really empathise with: learning a piece is "a life's project: even if I do learn [the notes] of the D minor Partita, that's just the beginning of ­interpreting and ­understanding that piece". He adds: "I'm struggling to express this, but there is something about ­playing that is wholly good for myself, ­uncomplicatedly good, in a moral sense. When you play music you are an agent, you are doing something rather than being a consumer or a subject. For me, it's part of being a human ­being."


The size and significance of the amateur sector is, I think, increasingly realised. The point the article makes is that quality is there too. It sometimes just goes with the love of music rather than the presence of payment. Charlotte Higgins has followed up with a blog asking for details of amateur groups - hopefully there'll be an upsurge in numbers of people using their instrumental skills.


Perhaps there is something in the air for 2010, about 'expressive lives'. The choir my wife and daughter sing in, which I've mentioned before, have started a 'sing for your supper' session at Arc in Stockton and had 80 people there last week - families of all ages and backgrounds making music together just for pleasure. I also had a lovely letter from a user of the Take It Away scheme recently, thanking us for making it possible for him to buy a banjo - 50 years since he gave up playing. The gentleman's aim was to be able to play it by his next (76th) birthday.


There, that's reminded me of the transformative power of the arts up enough to drive home now - do read the articles.

Is Tees Valley really the Land of Giants?

Back in May I wrote about a seminar on the 10th birthday of Anthony Gormley’s Angel of the North. I mentioned some other big public art projects. This morning I was at the launch of another, even bigger, which I couldn’t mention at the time. Tees Valley Giants is a five piece, five site, 10 year work by Anish Kapoor with Cecil Balmond, and today the first, Temenos, was unveiled in Middlesbrough. It is the world’s biggest public art initiative. (Until we hear different.) You can read local coverage of it here. Hopefully it’s the beginning of a productive debate: if everyone likes it straight away, it may not have the ‘transforming’ effect necessary.

For me this is not primarily a story of ‘culture-led regeneration’ – though it is that, in spades. Nor is it a story of partnership – though it is that too, with five local authorities, a regional development agency, the Arts Council, a regional foundation, and even the local premiership football club on board (Middlesbrough FC contributing cold hard cash to set an example of civic leadership to some other clubs) under the leadership of Tees Valley Regeneration. It is a story about art (and engineering) and excellence. Get a world class artist into the right place and the unimaginable can happen. You can link the past and future and you can bring people together behind a vision. Take a virtual tour here. And next year, all being well, come to Middlesbrough and see the real thing.

How many Angels can dance on the head of a pin?

Last week was a bit manic, hence the lack of posts. One day was spent at a symposium marking the 10th birthday of the Angel of the North, by Anthony Gormley. This was a more serious part of a series of events organised by Gateshead Council and partners to mark this occasion, including parties and processions. There’s no need for me to run through the history of the Angel here, but look through the Council’s Angel site for some arcane facts. Look carefully and you’ll see that the Arts Council and Northern Arts paid for most of it - perhaps the best value £600 grand we’ve spent in the last 10 years?

There was lots of talk about ‘Angel Envy’ and the phenomenon of Big Art Projects. There are a number on the go – some through Channel 4’s typically ‘does what it says on the tin’ project and associated mapping, and others like the so called Angel of the South in Ebbsfleet. This seems to be splitting opinion just as Gormley’s Angel did. And does. Good. Here are a few links to give you a flavour from the Guardian the Times, Channel 4, and for a local view Kent Online. Even the negative comments are a shadow of what greeted the first Angel sketches.

One of the best talks on Thursday was by my colleague Matthew Jarratt at Commissions North within Arts Council England, North East. If you want to see what the North East has done since the Angel visit our website – it also has lots of info about the commissioning process. We’re proud to spend less of our grants for the arts budget on public art projects than many other regions: there are probably more projects but we persuade others including the private sector to commission and pay for them, with Commissions North concentrating on advice, brokerage and supporting the design stage. Perhaps that’s the next phase elsewhere too?